Implications of Ethnic Group Origin for Israeli Women’s Mental Health

Abstract

Israel is an immigrant society comprised of diverse ethnic groups differentiated by variables such as emigration history, health status, educational level, and economic status. The major question addressed in this study is whether differences in women's mental health status are related to ethnic group origin, per se, or rather can be explained by the associated social-demographic strata. The impact of ethnic group origin, social support, health status, education, and economic difficulties was assessed on a set of mental health outcomes. The analysis was carried out in a random sample of 522 women residing in the Negev region of Israel-a culturally diverse area. The findings indicate that social support, economic status, health status, and ethnic group origin all contribute to shaping women's mental health status.

Cancer-related fatigue and depression in breast cancer patients postchemotherapy: Different associations with optimism and stress appraisals

“…Its internal reliability in previous studies was α ≥ 0.82 (Cohen et al, 2007 b ). It was translated into Hebrew (Cwikel & Segal-Engelchin, 2005; Iecovich & Cwikel, 2010), and its internal reliability (Cronbach's alpha) for our study was α 0.81.…”

“…We excluded the troublesleeping item, since it overlaps with the fatigue symptom inventory. It was translated into Hebrew (Cwikel & Segal-Engelchin, 2005;Iecovich & Cwikel, 2010), and its internal reliability (Cronbach's alpha) for our study was a 0.81. This questionnaire is widely used in research among cancer patients (Liu et al, 2009) and is suitable for testing with different age groups (Brown et al, 2003;Mui et al, 2002).…”

Development and Evaluation of the Adult Daughter–Mother Relationship Questionnaire (ADMRQ)

“…This is surprising in light of the robust nature of the consensus as found by Bengston and coresearchers as an indicator of intergenerational solidarity (Bengtson et al, 2002). Also, given that both immigration status and religious observance strongly affect women’s mental health (Cwikel & Segal-Engelchin, 2005), the findings that religiosity and immigration status were unrelated to the ADMRQ results were surprising. These results also differ from what Bengston found in his research on the social and cultural effects on intergenerational solidarity (Bengtson, 2001).…”

Individual, family, social, and cultural predictors of depressed mood in former soviet immigrant couples

“…Although some investigators have found that symptoms decrease in older age (particularly for men), symptoms might be more disabling for older adults (Barefoot et al, 2001; Mojtabai & Olfson, 2004). Midlife and older Soviet immigrants reported more depressive symptoms than non‐immigrants of the same age (Cwikel & Segal‐Engelchin, 2005; Miller & Chandler, 2002). Age may be confounded with time since immigration, however.…”

“…The social support has consistently been related to better adaptation and fewer depressive symptoms for immigrants (e.g., Cwikel & Segal‐Engelchin, 2005). There is, however, a differential effect for men and women: social support has a much stronger effect for women (Aroian et al, 2003; Masood, Okazaki, & Takeuchi, 2009).…”